World English

English is a global language but its vocabulary, spelling, and grammar varies around the world. This page is a first effort at tallying up the differences between English vocabulary as it is known throughout the English-speaking world. The most frequently known differences for people in the United States of America are between British and American English: Two countries divided by a common language. However, there are additional differences less well known to speakers of American English between American English and Australian English, Caribbean English, Canadian English, Indian (Asia) English, Irish English, New Zealand English, Scottish English, South African English, etc. Hopefully, with time we can get through them all to portray the astounding variety of ways a common language is used everywhere.

Contents

American-British English

There are many curious lists of differences that can be prepared. There are American words and phrases not known outside the United States and British words and phrases not known inside the United States. There are reciprocal pairs of words or phrases where American English will use one expression whereas British English will use another, but both share the same meaning. A particularly fascinating subset of these are the words and phrases which are known in both the U.K. and the U.S., but which have distinctly different meanings in each nation, English language "false friends".

Here are some American/British differences based on information from the Collins English Dictionary:

A

absorbent cotton (American) = cotton wool (British)

ad [Tennis] (American) = van [Tennis] (British)

adhesive tape (American) = sticking plaster (British)

aerial ladder (American) = turntable ladder (British)

American Revolution (American) = War of American Independence (British)